Dr Ramsey Urges Church Unity

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31584, 23 January 1968, Page 16

Dr Ramsey Urges Church Unity

(A .Z.P.A -Reuter—Copyright) LONDON, January 22. Britain had an urgent and practical need to return to the New Testament principle of one Church, the Archbishop of Canterbury. Primate of the Anglican Church, said in London yesterday.

He was speaking from a Methodist Church pulpit as millions of Christians of many denominations prayed in joint services and meetings throughout the country for unity between the longdivided Christian Churches. J The Archbishop, Dr Michael Ramsey, will also preach in Westminster Cathedral, Britain’s historic Roman Catholic Church, next Tuesday—the first sermon in the cathedral by an Anglican and highlight of the week of prayer which began last Thursday. A Salvation Army band played in the cathedral today as lay preachers led an inter-denominational service for the first time there. Dr Horace King, the Methodist Speaker of the House of Commons, led prayers and the war-time ace pilot, GroupCaptain Leonard Cheshire, V.C. (Roman Catholic) read scripture passages. The actor Mr Andrew Cruickshank (Anglican) gave an address. The unity prayer week, in which Protestant and Roman Catholic bishops in several parts of the country have

preached in each others churches, comes at a time when the major Christian churches are making prelim inary moves towards formulas for unity. The joirtt Anglican-Roman Catholic commission, which had its third meeting in Malta this month, will report to Pope Paul and Dr Ramsey on "the possibility of plotting some course towards unity.” Britain’s Methodists and Roman Catholics held their first talks last December, and the growing ecumenical movement was a central theme of the historic visit to London last November by Patriarch Athenagoras, Senior Patriarch of the Orthodox Churches, after his visit to the Pope in the Vatican. But conservatives of all Churches are hostile to unity, and observers point out that, despite these and other moves, there is still a long way to go before any formulas to join the divided Churches can be worked out.

Hole - In - One. —B. Gilmour scored a hole-in-one at ”The Oakes.” the eighth hole at the Kaiapoi golf course, on Saturday.